Breaking unhealthy patterns through emotional healing:

How to focus?

Everyday life is so hectic with incessant barriers. Our entire body and mind need to be taken care of to face these and become happy. But remember not perfect, the perfect human is not and will never be possible.

Happiness on the other hand can be achieved, sometimes this path is not clear. Long-term healing and an acceptance of who we are is vital to make it possible.

Carol Ryff developed the 6-factor model of psychological well-being showing us what positive functioning can look like.

1. Autonomy, means you are in control and self-regulate in social situations.

2. Environmental mastery, means competence in all contexts.

3. Personal growth, means continuous improvement in yourself.

4. Positive relations, with others means promotion in supporting others.

5. Purpose in life, means there is a sense of direction.

6. Self-acceptance, means there is a positive attitude towards yourself.

Don’t be scared to reflect on yourself, but it is okay if you are too!

What is emotional healing?

Emotional healing of our emotional health is a rarely used term, however, this phenomenon is necessary to ease the distressing experiences in life.

Emotional healing allows for a shift in our emotional well-being to be able to upgrade our minds away from anxious habits and handle waves of stress.

Peace is one of the keys to happiness. If we are at peace with our past, we can lead a happier, healthier future with more freedom. A source of peace that helps approximately 200-500 million people worldwide is meditation.

Being at peace means you can perceive yourself more accurately as there is nothing to cloud your self-judgement. Removing destructive habits can produce stronger coping mechanisms as your emotional agility has improved.

What are the healing properties of mindfulness?

Gaining a sense of mindfulness through methods like meditation can improve self-awareness, this can lead to contentment as the experience of emotions will not be as intense.

Yoga therapy heals our inner emotional wounds, which are invisible to the naked eye as it makes us more alert to our struggles. This is due to a positive mindset that breath-work creates. It helps us manage our stress. This mindset is a tool to apply a whole picture perspective to our world, meaning we can bounce back from our inevitable setbacks.

How yoga helps emotional healing?

Sometimes, it is hard to know where to start with these intangible feelings!

My answer is right here!

To gain long-term healing, our habits, routines and general outlook on life need to be different or at the very least healthier.

There is no way to put a timeframe on this process of healing as habits, such as practising regular yoga can take time to form and take even more effort to keep up. Yoga techniques can be hard to refine, but again nothing is perfect, and with emotional healing, you are on a path to overcome perfectionism and fears of failure.

Hip opener positions have shown to be the best for an individual to reach catharsis. We are vulnerable in this state as the 'flight and fight' response may want to kick in so we can protect ourselves, and even after a threat has subsided, we can store tension here, where emotional scarring can form.

These could include Child's pose, Pigeon pose, Savasana, Supported twist, Reclined bound angle and many more.

What is catharsis?

Catharsis is the emotional release of tension from a self-healing process. It allows an individual to feel a sense of refreshment, and gain fortitude. A 20-minute yoga session allows for your body to calm down but offers catharsis on a mental level too.

It is important towards building emotional strength and facing our bright opportunistic futures.

What is emotional intelligence?

The life satisfaction hill can be too steep for most, emotional intelligence (EI) that we have but at varying levels, is key to finding this fulfilment.

Emotional intelligence is significant in human interactions. It is the capacity we have to be in control of our thoughts, feelings, and behaviours, improving the overall quality of our interpersonal relationships.

Yoga therapy has been demonstrated to help individuals' emotional competency to handle challenging our negative thoughts, which may lead us down a discouraging pattern of behaviour. We need the intellect to regulate our emotions to cope.

So overall, what I am trying to say is listen to your emotions!

Habits are connected to our brain functions, so picking up positive ones like yoga can only be beneficial towards our mental health.

Emotional healing is a constant adaptation to what life has in store for us, and we can all face it together with each other's help, asking for support! That I can guarantee!

References:

·      6-factor model, Best news yet on the six-factor model of well-being - ScienceDirect

·      Emotional healing, 27 Meditation Statistics for Your Well-Being in 2021 (disturbmenot.co)

·      Peace and self-awareness, (tandfonline.com)

·      Effects of breath control, Frontiers, Human Neuroscience (frontiersin.org)

·      Yoga Poses towards emotional healing, 6 Yoga Poses to Release Difficult Emotions - DoYou

·      Catharsis, (verywellmind.com)

·      Enhancing emotional intelligence, Kumari A, Sahu KP. (2018).